The subject matter disclosed herein relates to clutched turbine wheels. Specifically, the subject matter disclosed herein relates to solutions for clutching turbine wheels to improve turbine performance.
Turbine machines, for example, steam turbines and gas turbines, include a plurality of wheels (or stages) at different locations along a main rotor shaft. These wheels each include a plurality of turbine blades, which during operation, drive rotation of the main rotor shaft via mechanical forces caused by the flow and expansion of a working fluid across the turbine blades. During startup of these turbine machines, or in times of lower load, reduced pressure in the machine may cause one or more of the turbine wheels to function inefficiently.